Abstract
DA VINCI In Da Vinci’s mind: Fundamental Correlates of Creativity for Artists and Scientists The study of creativity is essential for the understanding and development of the growth of human knowledge. This is ever more urgent today, as humanity is faced with unprecedented challenges: climate change, sustainability, geo-political uncertainty, and growing inequality. Both the World Economic Forum (WEF, 2019) and the OECD (2018) have recognized the need to develop creativity as a fundamental skill, starting from the younger generations. Despite rare examples of exceptional success in multiple knowledge domains (see Leonardo Da Vinci), historical examples as well as research evidence clearly show that creativity is domain-specific, i.e., it is expressed differently in diverse domains. In particular, the scientific and artistic domains are taken as extreme examples of the different phenomenological expressions of creative thinking. There are in particular two fundamental research questions which are still open: which are the functional and neural mechanisms that characterize and distinguish scientific versus artistic creative performance and achievement? Which is the optimal balance between creativity and intelligence to succeed in these two domains? In fact, a direct neurophysiological comparison of creativity in these two domains is lacking and clear evidences of the different neural correlates to creativity for artists and scientists are very scant. In the same way, rare evidence exists on the relationship between intelligent and creative behaviors in scientific and artistic contexts. The aim of the DA VINCI project is to fill these crucial gaps by systematically exploring the differences and commonalities in creative thinking performance and creative achievement in arts and science both from a neurophysiological and from a behavioral point of view. To this purpose, three WPs will be carried out with the main goals to: 1) analyse the core neural characterization of creative cognition in artists and in scientists. Based on the EEG methodology, a systematic exploration of the brain temporal dynamics associated with performance in diverse creative thinking tasks will be analysed in participants from scientific and artistic domains. Moreover, the spontaneous cerebral dynamics of a brain in resting state associated with the creative success in arts and science will be explored. 2) analyse the differential weight of intelligence and creativity according to the nature of the context in science and the arts. By an exploration of different conceptual spaces in arts and science characterized in terms of looseness and tightness, the explanatory role of intelligence and creative abilities to succeed in several scenarios within scientific and artistic domains will be explored. 3) define a theoretical and empirically testable model to explain, through a structural equation modelling approach, the role of brain dynamics, connectivity, creative abilities, intelligence and context in defining creative success in the arts and science. WP1 - Cerebral correlates of creative performance in science and the arts The aims of WP1 have been achieved through a set of complementary methodological and empirical activities focused on creativity in artists and scientists using different neuroscientific approaches (electroencephalography -EEG - and functional magnetic resonance - fMRI) and by the exploration of different research questions related to the cognitive, personality, and neurophysiological underpinnings of the creative process and behavior. A particular emphasis has been devoted to the development, validation, and exploration of methods to measure creative behaviors and creative self-beliefs before their use in experimental studies. In particular, the objectives have been achieved through: • an extensive analysis of the scientific literature on the neurophysiological correlates of creativity in artists and scientists and of the relationship between functional fixedness and knowledge domain; • the development of a new set of domain-specific and domain-general objects for the exploration of creativity in scientists and artists; • the empirical validation (through three independent, pre-registered studies) of the new set of stimuli, testing the role of stimuli modality on divergent thinking performance; • the exploration of the structural validity of the Short-Scale of Creative Self, as a measure to explore differences in creative identity and creative self-efficacy; • the development and set-up of a new experimental paradigm for exploring the temporal brain dynamics of creative ideation through divergent thinking in scientist and artists; • the electroencephalographic exploration of divergent thinking in representatives of the scientific domain (biology students) and of the artistic domain (students from the Conservatorium) • the set-up of a new experimental design to test the role -and the neurophysiological substrates- of memory structures and mechanisms on the insight phenomenon, as an empirical paradigm to explore convergent thinking; • the start of EEG data collection using the new experimental design to test the role of memory structures and processes in the insight phenomenon; • the development and set-up of a new experimental paradigm for testing through fMRI the brain structures and dynamics of the generation of new musical ideas (melodies) in professional musicians (pianists); • the start of a data collection with fMRI at the University of Malta on the brain dynamics of creative ideation in professional musicians; • dissemination activities through international conferences, workshops and paper publication submitted to peer-reviewed journals. Overall, these activities produced theoretical, methodological, and empirical outcomes fully consistent with the scientific and applicative objectives of the PRIN 2022 DA VINCI project, contributing to the advancement of research on the domain-specific (especially in artists and in scientists) and domain-general neurophysiological and behavioral properties of creativity. WP2 - Convergent and divergent thinking in the space-time continuum for scientists and artists The aims of WP2 have been achieved through a set of complementary theoretical, methodological, and empirical activities focused on creativity in artists and scientists across traditional and artificial intelligence (AI) contexts. In particular through: • an extensive analysis of the scientific literature on creativity and on the relationship between intelligence and creativity in artists and scientists; • the development and validation of new experimental paradigms for manipulating conceptual space within the Space-Time Continuum framework; the empirical investigation of divergent thinking in artists and scientists operating in more or less restricted conceptual contexts; • the extension of creativity research to cyber-creative contexts, reflecting the growing role of AI in artistic and scientific professions; • the definition of cyber-creativity and the systematic examination of ten key research challenges; • the benchmarking of AI tools for creative purposes and the development of a GPT (GPT DA-VINCI), including the DA VINCI model of creativity; • a Turing-test-like experiment with a specific sample of creative professionals (designers); • the analysis of creative self-beliefs in traditional and in cyber-creativity process, both in the general population and in a targeted sample of design students; • the study of frictional AI protocols with design students to enhance human agency in the cyber-creative process; • the focus on the need to think long-term in a world that is moving ever faster and impacting the way artists and scientists work. • the study of the role of bias and heuristics in the process of imagining long-term futures. • dissemination activities through international conferences, workshops and paper publication on peer-reviewed journals. Overall, these activities produced theoretical, methodological, and empirical outcomes fully consistent with the scientific and applicative objectives of the PRIN 2022 project, contributing to the advancement of research on the creativity of artists and scientists in both traditional and AI-augmented contexts. WP3 - Structural analysis of the behavioral and cerebral predictors of creative achievement in science and art The general aim of WP3, that is to increase the theoretical understanding of the creative process both in its domain-specific and in its domain-general characteristics, has been achieved through the exploitation of the insights and of the results obtained in WP1 and WP2. A strict and constant collaboration between the two research Units, led to the proposition of: • a new research field, cyber-creativity, as a new emerging empirical and theoretical study domain to explore the interactive dynamics between human and machines in a co-creative virtuous process; • a research agenda for the research community for the understanding and use of cyber- creativity; • a new, refined theoretical model for the understanding of the dynamic creative process, the DA VINCI theoretical model; • a new theoretical model, the IDHOL model, for the understanding of the study and understanding of individual differences in the creative process. These activities produced tangible theoretical outcomes fully consistent with the scientific objectives of the PRIN 2022 DA VINCI project, contributing to the advancement of the understanding of the phenomenology of the creative process also in the light of the rapid advancements in technological innovation. Research within the project was carried out under the principles of open science. Preregistrations have been performed and openly released when specific hypotheses could be formulated on the basis of previous research and existing theoretical frameworks.
Dettagli del progetto
Responsabile scientifico: Giovanni Emanuele Corazza
Strutture Unibo coinvolte:
Dipartimento di Ingegneria dell'Energia Elettrica e dell'Informazione "Guglielmo Marconi"
Coordinatore:
Università degli Studi di TRIESTE(Italy)
Contributo totale Unibo: Euro (EUR) 84.196,00
Durata del progetto in mesi: 24
Data di inizio
05/10/2023
Data di fine:
28/02/2026
